


oh girl

by smutpeddler



Category: American Horror Story: Murder House
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Medium - Freeform, request
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-04
Updated: 2019-03-04
Packaged: 2019-11-09 01:12:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17991995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smutpeddler/pseuds/smutpeddler
Summary: a medium is ordered by her father to cleanse the murder house. and everything is changed.story request, get yours at stargazingwithcassidy.tumblr.com





	oh girl

**Author's Note:**

> The request; "Hey 😈💕 Can I request a Tate Langdon imagine where the reader is a ghost hunter or supernatural hunter or whatever, and she and her team move into Murder House to investigate it and all that, but she ends up growing close with Tate and doesn’t want to get rid of him??"
> 
> to send your own request visit; stargazingwithcassidy.tumblr.com

_You have to, sweetling._

It’s a never ending echo in my mind. Gnawing on my brain stem, pounding against my skull until it’s the only thing I hear. See. Feel.  _Taste._  A have to I had never agreed to. My nails dig into my scalp, I want to scream but no matter how hard I push nothing comes from mouth but a strangled cry.

_You have to do it, sweetling._

“What’s wrong?”

His voice slices through the living nightmare like a hot knife through butter.

My eyes burn, everything hurts, a deep, dull ache that seems like it will never go away. And once more, no matter how hard I try nothing comes from my gaping maw, nothing but gasping breaths.

The scream finally comes, shrill, glass shattering before the entire would went black.

*

It’s a house. Just a house. At least it had been before all that had happened. But now it breaths, deep, long breaths, calming itself before you step beyong the gate and into its’ embrace. Finally close enough to be swallowed up, body and soul. Just a house like all the others I’d been forced into.

“So, what am I doing here again?” my brother asks, leaning back against the passenger door.

I roll my eyes, “Jack shit,” not even b

Not bothering to turn around, “Go get the hotel set up for Dad and Alanna. Then go do your coke or whores. Whatever it is you do.”

“ _Bitch,_ ” barely a breath, lost in the static of the house.

_Murder House._

I step inside, carefully closing the door behind me. Phone off, bag abandoned on the floor of the foyer. The house moves under my feet, each step felt like my shoes had been coated in pitch. It knows what I am, why I’m here, if it had a mouth I can only imagine it would be watering. This place is so different from all the others. The aslyum in New England. The haunted fields of Florida. They had been just as dark and foreboding but they had been lost in time. Weak from starvation until all that was left were shattered whispers and sneaking shadows.

This place though, with it’s stained glass windows and high ceiling, was full. Far past the brim. New, old, screaming for so many things they would never have.  _Could_ never have. There’s crying. So much crying. Each voice overlapping the other.  _I want to leave._ _I lover. I deserve him._ Skittering feet and pop snaps are punctuated by the mischievous giggles of children. Music echoes in the air, full of sadness, the stringed instrument strangling complimenting the low sound of The Smiths.

“You shouldn’t be here,” the voice is smooth, calming in that fatherly tone my own had never been able to master.

With a slow turn I find kind blue eyes staring back at me, “I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be,” he almost laughs, he thinks he knows, “That’s what my dad says.”

It destroys his grin, those eyes probing deep into my own, “Then he isn’t a very good dad,” Who had he been?

I shrug, what else could I do, “The only one I got.”

“You  _will_ die here.”

I step backwards, spinning on my heel, “That’s the hope.”

*

“Wake up,” it’s far away, muffled, like trying to make out a whisper in a snow storm while wearing ear muffs, “You have to wake up.”

I want to, so badly. I want to wrap myself in his voice and let it pull me into perfect clarity. But I can’t, can’t do anything but open my eyes. Trying to grab a handful of rain.

*

There’s the Harmons; Ben, Vivien, Violet, and Jeffrey. A lovely family in the worst place, worst time. Hugo & Moira, both paying the price for his sin. The Montgomery’s, the reason this place stood. Chad and Patrick, feuding exes locked together in eternity. The Great Elizabeth Short. Gladys and Maria, colls in a murderer’s sick fantasy joined by the 20-somethings desperate to live in the shadow of his infamy. More and more popped out of the shadows with every step deeper into the house. So many children, too many children. I want to cry, I almost do. But something bores into me, someone I haven’t seen yet. Dark, dangerous, and soft.

“I can feel your eyes,” I whisper, stepping into another bedroom, collapsing on an abandoned mattress that sent dust flecks flying in the fading sunlight like falling stars, “You can’t hide forever. Sooner or later, I always see.”

*

“I can’t lose you too,” my neck is wet, hot and sticky with tears and snot, “You can’t leave me.”

 _I won’t,_ I want to say,  _Never._  But my lips don’t move, my body held down by an impossible weight.

“ _Please don’t go!_ ”

*

Hours later I return to my bag. Surprisingly everything’s still there, if a bit riffled through. My phone is on now, no notifications at least. In actuality there had been 3 missed calls from Dad, 2 from Alanna and a text from Leon asking if I knew anywhere to score. I slide a smoke between my lips, heft my bag on my shoulder and swipe through to call back my father.

“Sweetling,” he cooes, sickeningly sweet, full of lies.

I drop my bag in front of the fire place, “If he’s on coke, he  _is not_ coming in this house,” lighting the tip of the cigarette.

“He won’t,” I can almost picture Alanna’s offended face, drug store painted tickle-me-pink lips curled in a scowl, “What did you see?”

“You know what you saw,” hitting the big red button and dropping it with a clatter on the mantel piece, “Fuck you!” I can’t stop it ripping through my throat or the tears that spring to the corner of my eyes. But what is there to do? I inhale the acrid smoke, deep if a bit shaky, before rifling in the bag once more. My fingers grip tightly around the cool bottle neck. Whiskey, a brand new fifth just for me. For this this first night.  _The worst night_.

“Let’s get started, shall we?”

*

“I thought I knew what it felt like,” lips press to the shell of my ear, voice that quiet whisper that made my heart speed up, “I needed her. I couldn’t breath without her. That’s love, right?” his breath shakes, “No. It’s not. That’s not love. That’s…” he struggles for the word, I struggle to pull myself back, “ _Obsession._ ”

I want to wrap my arms around him. Hold him close. Promise him all the love in the world, rip out my heart and hand it over to him. Freely, no strings attached. I’m not strong enough. I’m not strong enough for any of it.

“ _I love you._ You have to come back,” a fresh batch of tears soak into my shirt, “You have to say it back!”

*

A quarter of the bottle is gone, I’m on my 6th cigarette in the last two hours, wandering between the index cards and ribbon that have taken over the floor. Some are easy, like Moira and Nora. Others might remain in these damned walls until the end of the world. I can’t think about them. I want to.  _I should_. But all I can think about is the feel of those eyes, as if they were trying to my being by burning their way in through the back of my skull.

“It’s alright to be scared. All of you are so used to being able to hide, I can’t imagine how terrifying it is to lose that,” sitting on the edge of the couch that had been re-purposed into a shoddy bed, “I feel like that sometimes.”

But there’s only silence, only ever silence. I take two long gulps from the bottle, the burn of cheap whiskey against the smoke torn flesh of my throat is grounding. It’s time to sleep, to dream all their memories, to hurt as they do. Maybe this will be the time, maybe this time I’ll finally fall over the edge. Insanity, even Death, had to be better than the Hell that is my existence.

*

It must be later. Had I drifted off? Had I ever really come too? He’s curled around me as a mother does around a still born pip. Deep, even breathing assaults my senses, he’s finally asleep. Finally calm. But what am I? What’s happening to me?

“It’s in your head,” it’s Ben, that smooth, fatherly voice that seems to ease every nerve, “You’ll be fine. Eventually,” a rough thumb rubs my cheek, “He’s not a good dad. Do not let him control you. Not anymore.”

*

A hand carts through my hair, over and over again. It’s comforting, soft. I’ve never felt that. I curl towards it, losing myself in it between the great peeks of sleep and alcohol. The tips of finger, lighter than spider legs, trace the jut of my cheekbone, the curve of my lips.

“I’m not scared you’ll see me,” the voice is silk, lips satin against the curve of my ear, “I’m scared that I want you to.”

There’s a heaviness to the admission, something hiding beneath the words. I want to tell him to let me, face his fear,  _move forward_. But he’s so gentle, my eyelids are heavy, and I drift back off. For the first time since I was 6 years old, I dream of nothing.

I wake to my head pounding and a dry mouth, but I am nothing but happy. No scream, pain,  _death_. Just a restful slumber. Those fingers still dance through my tangled mane, I almost don’t open my eyes. I want to live in this comfort forever. My phone chirps, I don’t have the luxury of laying here forever. With a groan, I force my eyes open.

 _He’s beautiful_. Messy, bright blonde hair over soulful chesnut eyes, skin almost glowing in the morning sunlight. And he’s smiling at me, looking at me like no boy had ever been given the chance to. I can feel the smile pulling the corner of my lips, they crack and bleed, stretched to tightly for how chapped my whiskey soaked night had left them.

“Who are you?” that same voice, I want to wrap myself in it.

I shake my head, “I don’t know.”

“What are you doing here?” he tries again.

“I don’t really know that either,” he’s frustrated by my inability to answer.

“Then what do you know?”

I hum happily, “I like what you’re doing.”

*

“He makes you do this, doesn’t he?” The memories spring up. And while I can’t move, let alone answer, the tears that burn my eyes speak deeper than I could ever have, “But it doesn’t matter,” he exhales hard, wrestling with some deeper demon inside himself, “I was a therapist, you know? I spent years-” he shakes his head, “No one control your life but you.  _Your life is yours, sweetling._ ”

*

He vanished in an instant and I’m left to my own devices. To explore deeper, discover.  _Learn_. But it overwhelms too quickly. There’s too many horrible memories, too much hurt. Every presence has a story, everything I touch is imbued with a story. I slide myself onto the kitchen island, sliding an expertly rolled joint stolen from my shit if a brother between my lips. Lighting the tip, I let myself fall back, cool marble almost pleasant, exhaling deeply the high begins to leak in at the edges of my mind. Another hit has me kicking off my slip ons and closing my eyes. There’s something calming about this place. It’s real. Not shadows, whispers on the wind. For the first time I don’t feel like an outsider. I’m a part of some screwed up community. Maybe they want to hurt me, even kill me but I’m a part of something.

“Are you lonely?” it’s the same voice as before, stabbing right through me in the most exciting way.

My exhale is long, deliberate, for no particular reason than the moment seemed to call for it, “Not here,” the pleasant buzz making my planned shake of the head more of a slow loll back and forth.

“Tell me your name,” the pleading is so clear, no matter how calm he tries to act.

I smile into the next hit, stubbing the joint out on the counter, I let it lose, “I don’t have one,” smoke curls around the words.

“ _Everyone_  has a name,” I can feel the tips of his fingers brush my knee, just the breath of skin to skin sends a shiver up my spin and goosebumps from head to toe.

Clicking my tongue, I lifted my arms, letting them fall above me, “Not me,” it’s almost a song.

My voice has never done that.  _My body_ has never done that. Was this-

“Are you flirting with me?”

I know that the next words that out of my mouth will piss him off but I have no others, “ _I don’t know._ ”

He grabs my thighs, jerks them apart and pins my hips against the counter with is own, “ _Then what do you know?_ ” it’s angrier. Jagged nails digging hard into the thin fabric of my shorts. I can feel him. Straining towards me.

I’m too stoned to be scared, to high to worry, it takes everything in me not to giggle, “ _I like you_.”

I expect him to vanish again. Disappear without a trace. He doesn’t. His hand grips my face, hard, squeezing my cheeks and puckering my lips.

“Open your eyes.”

I grin, big and bright, his eyes almost black when my own finally flutter open, “I know when you’re here,” there’s no thought, it bubbles out of my throat. It feels like happiness.

I’ve never flirted, never looked, just as I had been taught. I sure as hell had never been kissed. I don’t know what to do. He doesn’t care, through my awkward teeth clanking and limp arms, he somehow makes up for all the times I had never been able to do this.

“ _You’re mine._ ”

That’s when he vanishes.

*

I wake with a start. My limbs creak from hours, maybe a day, without use. And I’m alone. Slowly and painfully I manage to sit up, and with the same effort stand.

“I love you,” it’s a croak, barely a sounds. Arms grip me tight around the waist, “I really do.”

“What happened?” he presses the lightest of kisses along the curve of my neck, pulling me closer as if I would melt into him.

I swallow hard, reaching behind me to wrap my arms around his neck, “He wants me to empty the house. So he can sell it.”

“You can’t do that.”

“I won’t,” my body shakes, knowing what that means, what has to come next, “But he won’t accept that,” what I would have to do to keep him, “As long as I’m alive, he’ll find a way to make me.”

His lips vibrate against the shell of my ear as he hums, “I can make it quick. So it won’t hurt.”

“Just say it one more time,” curling my fingers into his hair.

“ _I love you._ ”


End file.
